Mining the West

The Colton firm reissued their standard United States map in 1849 and highlighted the gold region in California by adding regional labels only. Lettering for "United States" still floats diagonally across the map, avoiding the old Mexican turf. The old boundary lines are documented with notes about the treaties defining them from 1819 and 1828.

The eagle cartouche is surrounded by emblems of American power and trade. Progress is shown in the various steamboats and trains. Produce and trade goods decorate this image of a Western port scene. The heavily decorative border includes several Western scenes, Mexican cowboys rounding up wild cattle, the Cathedral in Mexico City, Willamette Falls, Oregon, and Astoria, Oregon.

The newly won territory of "Upper or New California" is named, with the pre-Gadsden Purchase border clearly shown, along the Gila River. The Gadsden Purchase of 1854, of 30,000 square miles of northern Mexican territory (now southern Arizona and southern New Mexico), was the last major border change of the Mexican Republic. "New Mexico" appears as a narrow vertical strip covering the Santa Fe Valley.

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